What is the statistical advantage in greening up?

Greening up is just another bet

You need the same skills

Didn't realize you were talking about trading. No idea!

It's value in the market at the particular time you green up that over the long term will determine the value of greening up. If the odds are consistently wrong in running it is to your advantage.

Far from a statistical advantage I think you also need to consider the psychological advantage of greening up. Discipline and chasing are common problems. If you constantly red and green your bets you are flattening the fluctuations which for me personally, is a distinct benefit. I don't like massive wins and losses, I'd rather have a steady incremental increase.

One advantage is that you will have more winning bets (although your ROI will be lower). This can reduce wild fluctuations in bankroll which can be handy if you're a medium-longish odds against backer, though not particularly worthwhile if your usual price range is evens or below.

At the moment, I am greening up if it offers a 20% profit on my stake. I figure this will improve my overall profitability, but I am not so sure that this is the case from a mathematical point of view.

Why 20%? Just seems arbitrary. Won't necessarily mean it's value to green up will it?

Well, I figure that I couldn't achieve more than 10-15% profit long-term on my stakes, so 20% should serve to increase, rather than decrease my overall profitability. But I'm not sure about this. The math gets quite tricky.

You seem to be betwixt and between. Trader or Punter? If you trade every initial bet then there may well be a certain % which will be optimally profitable for you. When you let them run though you're not trading but punting. If your original opinions are +EV ones then you're probably better off letting them run rather than giving up the value you've earned.

It's sods law.

If you do it will cost you
If you don't it will cost you :)

There is no advantage. It depends entirely on the market if it's worth it.

There's an advantage to bankroll growth in reducing variance.

Other than that, not much.

you need a math(S) expert snapper not a math expert

I agree with what the inner city sumo has to say, but I also think it can work the other way. I'm a greener-upper. I generally green-up very quickly in in-running markets. This can occasionally have the effect of thinking 'if only I let that ride', or 'why did I green-up so early?' The tendency is to remember these instances and forget the times when it's gone in your favour. But, like sumo, I prefer smaller consistent winnings (not so good with the PC!) than large winnings and losses.

One potential problem of a greening up approach is that you may end up staking higher, as you are working with smaller percentages. When you don't get the opportunity to green up, you have done a bigger stake than you would normally bet to

it slows downt he rate you lose at, also slows down the rate you win at.

Far better for your sanity ...even if it costs in the long run

Snapper

I had this same conversation with myself some time back. For me the answer is to log BOTH scenarios for each bet you undertake. Whether you trade that particular bet or let it run, log both eventualities. This is then handy to look back on, allowing you to say to yourself, "Well, if I'd let every bet run I would have this P&L, but if I'd traded every bet I would have this P&L.

This will push you one way or the other I suspect.

The market isn't totally efficient.

Therefore you can green up even without anything happening in your favour, purely due to the price spread. Do it.

In the ideal world you should only ''green up'' when your closing bet is what is called a ''good value'' bet, but I'm sure no one can wait for that. ''Greening up'' is easy but what isn't easy is ''redding up'', and most people don't know how to handle that, and it's more difficult, that is, accepting a loss.
That has to be dealt with.

Greening up is a sure- fire way to attract the premium charge.

However inner city sumo makes a very salient point about the inner calm it brings about

just see it as a sperate bet. if you want to trade out and its odds 2 to back but you see chances of the player to win less than 50% then don`t green up cause you only lose value. if you want to reduce risks or huge bankroll swings thats something else to consider but from a value or longterm winning point of you you should see the trading out bet always as a seperate bet and bet only if value.

kenilworth 22 Mar 23:11
In the ideal world you should only ''green up'' when your closing bet is what is called a ''good value'' bet, but I'm sure no one can wait for that. ''Greening up'' is easy but what isn't easy is ''redding up'', and most people don't know how to handle that, and it's more difficult, that is, accepting a loss.
That has to be dealt with.

So true - sometimes the best "bet" is the one which closes your position for a guaranteed loss

I fully accept that pyschologically speaking, its more difficult to red up then green up.

However, if someone is genuinely operating in a way that is fully incorporating the value concept, then this process of redding up becomes a lot easier to handle.

Mine is none all winners matched about 1 in 5 losers get matched. I am just giving money away on winners.

was this before you took to the high seas?

That's strange...someone has taken me moniker...gift it back ye scoundrel!

Anyway..to answer ye inquiry...ALWAYS GREEN UP or RED UP!

Anyway..to answer ye inquiry...ALWAYS GREEN UP or RED UP! Ask yourself 'tis inquiry: Do I be needin' to WIN...or do I be needin' to be PROFITABLE?

If it's not something you've thought about clearly and accurately, there is no advantage in greening up unless the second bet offers correct value or better.

However, and it's easier said than done, if you can incorporate a strategy that predicts market movements and you have sufficient backup plans (extra internet connection, other places to place a bet if betfair has one of it's unexpected outages etc), then as long as you know when you're going to green and red up, you can have a bigger initial bet because you're not betting on the outcome of the event so much as the outcome of the market.

For instance, if we say it's 30-70 that the market goes from 1.67 to 1.68 and the rest of the time it goes to 1.66 and we have no other information at all. You can bet heavily on the 1.67 as long as you bail when it touches 1.68 (as it may be going to 25.0 next, we have no other information) and treat the whole thing as one bet where greens and reds are really 1/100th their normal value (It's not exactly that, but near enough to get the point across)

It is very easy to demonstrate mathematically that you should often green up at less than value, and you should always green up at value.

Suppose we have a 2-horse race. The true probabililty of A winning is 50%, and you have managed to back him for $100 at 2.1. Assuming you are on 5% commission, your expected return for this market is now:

(0.95 * 0.5 * 110) - (0.5 * 100)

= $2.25

However, if you had greened up by laying off at 2, you would have had $5 green each side, and after commission:

0.95 * 5

= $4.75



As should be clear, in the same scenario above, even if you had only managed to lay off at 2.04, say, you would still make more than by leaving the bet ($2.79 after commission in this case).

Which be what we band 'o pirates have known all along...it be th' commission which kills th' betters.

I guess that's the point at which it starts to tend towards an art form Contrarian, because with efficient markets, you could get a better green up later, sometimes a very short time later as the market heads towards it's true value.

Of course in reality, if you've had a bet at 3.0 because it's a slightly big price, then when that same selection becomes a 50% chance, then it's likely the market will still underrate that selection and 2.04 or something will be as good as it gets.

no one ever went broke greening up